I made one in 7th grade or mabey it was 8th?? either way i did. I still have it on a shelf next to me. We used a lenght of string to keep the car straight. The string would slide through two little eyelets on the car.

Freshman year in HS.
i used wheels from a Hotwheels car, a 6" piece of 1/8" dowel rod, and enough balsa to hold the cartridge in the rear, and a small chunk in the front to hold 2 wheels, and super glued some pieces of a straw on the bottom for the fishing line, it was the fastest car....
that was till my buddy decided to just glue a straw to a catridge.

needless to say he had received a few days of detention because it almost took someones head off as it ricochet off lockers going down the hallway!!

Its funny you ask that, I made this same post in the pinewood derby thread. In my 8th grade shop class, the top 5 cars went to "state" for the competition. My car was one of the 5. For some reason our cars were judged on speed and the blueprint of it. I sucked at drafting, so I half assed my blueprint. Somehow my blueprint was good enough to allow me to run in the state competition. I was not there, but our shop teacher represented everybody. My car won, 100%, it was the fastes car there. The org that was putting it on decided to look into how my car was physically staying together because its body was so small, that it should have broke on the crash mat.

Well, they took a pocket knife to the body until they hit the steel rod. One of the last memories I have of my uncle (who died at 27) was him helping me drill and installing that steel rod.

Its funny you ask that, I made this same post in the pinewood derby thread. In my 8th grade shop class, the top 5 cars went to "state" for the competition. My car was one of the 5. For some reason our cars were judged on speed and the blueprint of it. I sucked at drafting, so I half assed my blueprint. Somehow my blueprint was good enough to allow me to run in the state competition. I was not there, but our shop teacher represented everybody. My car won, 100%, it was the fastes car there. The org that was putting it on decided to look into how my car was physically staying together because its body was so small, that it should have broke on the crash mat.

Well, they took a pocket knife to the body until they hit the steel rod. One of the last memories I have of my uncle (who died at 27) was him helping me drill and installing that steel rod.

hahaha..

My car was the smallest possible in all dimensions, and the neck at the smallest point is about the size of a 3/16 dowel rod. It didn't break because I picked a block that had a grain pattern that was exactly what I wanted, then I cut my neck at the same angle as the grain.

No metal rod needed

What year was that? Your probably the asshole that beat me at state that year.

My car was the smallest possible in all dimensions, and the neck at the smallest point is about the size of a 3/16 dowel rod. It didn't break because I picked a block that had a grain pattern that was exactly what I wanted, then I cut my neck at the same angle as the grain.

No metal rod needed

What year was that? Your probably the asshole that beat me at state that year.

hahaha. holy cow, 8th grade had to be in 1995.

My car was DQ'd of course, and I received a very long lecture from Mr. Lamb (awesome shop teacher) on how I made him look stupid around his friends who were also shop teachers.

I have that car somewhere, I need to find it and take a picture. I had forgotten about it, and